small talk- or not.

Let no corrupting talk come out of your mouths, but only such as is good for building up, as fits the occasion, that it may give grace to those who hear. --Eph 4:29

I do not remember with clarity what i was like as a child. The memories seem gaping and the old photographs only tell so much. I suppose i had been happy. Yes, with the occasional anger bursts and confusion at how adults acted; the words they used. But i suppose i had been happy. After all, a child would not really know what the opposite would've been like.

I was quiet in kindy, i was allowed outdoors less than i would have preferred but enough. I enjoyed talking, but talked less than any other kid i knew back then. Doesn't help much coming from a family which placed great emphasis on 'not talking out of turn,' at least back in those days. In fact, kindergarten earned me the label "quiet" for three years consecutively in the report card. Believe it.

I don't know why i'm telling you this but it seems important to.

I've done much soul searching.

Unfortunately, i cannot help but feel that the harder i try, the further i am from discovering who i really am. They say it's good to be adaptable, flexible, to be able to understand quickly how to approach different people. I can be hot or cold, i can be polite or expressive, i can be quiet when the need arises, i talk when people need to listen. What if i got so good at camouflaging myself to the crowd that i am neither this nor that at the end of the day??

There is a strange power to words.

The tongue has the power of life and death. --Proverbs 18:21 

I've always been drawn to that. Words can mesmerise, words can captivate, words can comfort, words can console, encourage, heal, bring life and change perceptions. But words can also crush, destroy, eat up a person, hurt and break. The very absence of words itself can leave a person longing, leave a person waiting and well, it can speak a thousand words.

The thing is there can be no taking back what is being said. I am sick of wasting words. I am sick of saying things i would later come to regret. The strange gnawing feeling after hearing the words in your head being formed by the mouth into verbal, audible and strong words.

If life had a record, like that of a phone memory, how many words would i have spoken in total since birth?
How many built another person? How many comforted and consoled? How many brought laughter and joy? How many destroyed others? How many judged? How many insulted, condemned, reprimanded and were thrown out of anger? How many were unnecessary? How many reflected my insecurities?

I wonder.

Sometimes, less is more.

I used to believe everything ought to be voiced out. I used to say whatever's on my mind, without pausing to consider the consequences. Call it confidence, but i call it ignorance.

At the end of the day, i realised that it will be alright if nobody remembered words i have spoken before because truth be told, i tend to say the wrong ones at the wrong times. I hope rather, that my companionship, my presence offered in Christ, would have meant something to you and would've brought you a glimmer of hope.